Reading
An expert in the law stood up to test Jesus.“Teacher,” he said, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.”
But wanting to vindicate himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and took off, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan while traveling came upon him, and when he saw him he was moved with compassion. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, treating them with oil and wine. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ‘Take care of him, and when I come back I will repay you whatever more you spend.’ Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
Luke 10:25-37 (NRSV)
Reflection
Who is my neighbor? Or, as we are sometimes tempted to ask, who is not my neighbor?
We are not called only to love and care for the people closest to us. We are called to love people we have never met, people who think differently than we do, and people whose opinions, experiences, or beliefs may make them feel far away from us.
John Wesley wrote these notes about this parable:
“Let us renounce that bigotry and party-zeal which would contract our hearts into an insensibility for all the human race, but a small number whose sentiments and practices are so much our own, that our love to them is but self-love reflected.”
In other words, it is easy to love people who think like us, agree with us, and make us feel understood. But if our love extends only to people who are similar to us, it can become less like love and more like loving ourselves reflected back to us.
On Sunday, Pastor Mark left us with this question: “What extreme person in your life is Jesus calling you to love?”
Maybe a good next step is to pray for that person. And I do not mean spending our prayer time asking God to change them. I mean sitting quietly with God, listening, and, when we are ready, asking a different question: God, who are you calling me to be for this person?
Prayer
“May I learn to see those living around me as neighbors, and may the word neighbor come to mean ‘beloved.'”
-From May It Be So, by Justin McRoberts & Scott Erickson
